That's a nice idea, but would also be easy to abuse, for example with death protection (which Tikki hates, but the free dodge after DP might be worth it). Also by fighting low damage enemies to trigger the guaranteed dodge, then using that on the boss. But at least it would require healing before it can be done again. This allows for huge abuse with regen though: regen to just past the HP threshold, hit a low damage enemy to take you below the threshold and trigger the dodge, hit the boss (taking no damage), go regen just past the threshold, attack the low damage enemy to trigger dodge, etc. Also I think it's too complicated.

Maybe all dodging could be changed to work like the quicksilver potion, stacking up when you get hit and resetting when you dodge. Values would need to be adjusted of course, but this would provide some degree of reliability and allow interesting tactics without too much potential for abuse (desecrating TT's altar or using a really big sword to give low level enemies first strike and using that to stack dodge is the only abuse I can currently think of). Also there would still be some randomness in the mix, because if you don't use the stacked dodge you might lose it when you don't actually need it, and the more reliable it gets the more likely you are to lose it while stacking it up further.

Yes, dodge is a random mechanic, but currently it's a 100% avoidable random mechanic. If it's not your cup of tea, don't play rogue and don't get dodge from Tikki. As it stands you can play Desktop Dungeons avoiding it entirely and not be at all the worse for it.

I don't mind it, myself. I never risk death, but it's a nice to sometimes be able to take down a higher level monster that needs 2 hits to kill you, but you need time enough for 3.

Galefury wrote:Maybe all dodging could be changed to work like the quicksilver potion, stacking up when you get hit and resetting when you dodge. Values would need to be adjusted of course, but this would provide some degree of reliability and allow interesting tactics without too much potential for abuse (desecrating TT's altar or using a really big sword to give low level enemies first strike and using that to stack dodge is the only abuse I can currently think of). Also there would still be some randomness in the mix, because if you don't use the stacked dodge you might lose it when you don't actually need it, and the more reliable it gets the more likely you are to lose it while stacking it up further.

Then you could just keep plinking away at monsters that do minimal damage, until your dodge rate gets up to 100% (or whatever cap is imposed, if any), then hit the boss. If you dodge before you get to 100%, try again. At least with quicksilver potions, you have to spend quite a bit of resources to obtain another one each time you successfully dodge.

Heck, maybe just remove dodging as an inherent trait, and have Rogues start out with like three or four quicksilver potions in their inventory. Or to cut out the randomness altogether, quicksilver potions could grant a guaranteed dodge but be made much more expensive, say 75 piety a piece, and Rogues start out with only one potion.

Galefury wrote:Heck, maybe just remove dodging as an inherent trait, and have Rogues start out with like three or four quicksilver potions in their inventory. Or to cut out the randomness altogether, quicksilver potions could grant a guaranteed dodge but be made much more expensive, say 75 piety a piece, and Rogues start out with only one potion.

That could actually work. After all it's just one free attack, and not *that* much stronger than death protection/WEYTWUT/first strike. Plus this means no synergy with the Reflex boon, so hardly abusable.

The only problem would be how many such potions should a Rogue start with. It must be an viable strategy tool without Tiki Tooki, and one seems a bit unreliable (but still vastly superior to the Fighter's one inherent death protection).

Or that make it so that Rogue gains guaranteed(or less) dodge after drinking a health potion. For the delicious irony of it. And making Halfling Rogue just ungodly strong.

There's actually a strategy you can use with dodge, as long as you even have the slightest bit of dodge chance, AS LONG as you can survive more than 1 hit from whatever you're trying to kill.

Let's say you need 3 hits to kill a higher level enemy, but you can only manage to trade 2 blows as a Dwarf Rogue before you die.

Hit the enemy. Did you dodge?

No - Regenerate your health. Hit the enemy again.Yes - Congratulations. You can now hit the enemy 2 more times at full health which means you can kill it.

Very much in theory you can use it to kill enemies that require 4 hits, 5 hits etc but of course your chance of dodging twice in a row is drastically lower. It IS possible though and if you pull it off you could get a giant slingshot.

The problem, of course, is that if you don't dodge then you need to regenerate - you are consuming a scarce resource and didn't get any benefit out of it. Typically as a Rogue you'll have the option of killing a monster one or two levels above you, which you can do without dodging (either because you have enough health or death protection to take a hit, or enough damage or enough fireballs to not need a second hit), or going after a monster two or three or four levels above you, which you can do only if you successfully dodge. Since dodging is so unlikely, even with Tikki Tooki's bonuses, you should pretty much always go with the lower level monster so as to conserve your regeneration. Even if taking the risky approach doesn't kill you outright, it does make you much more likely find that you haven't enough tiles to continue leveling up, or enough other resources to beat the boss.

I'm warming up to the idea of giving Rogues one or two guaranteed one-time dodges, since that gives them about the same benefit that they currently have but makes the player choose when to use it. More player choices means more player strategizing and less player-cursing-the-RNG, which means more fun.

q 3 wrote:I'm warming up to the idea of giving Rogues one or two guaranteed one-time dodges, since that gives them about the same benefit that they currently have but makes the player choose when to use it. More player choices means more player strategizing and less player-cursing-the-RNG, which means more fun.

q 3 wrote:Then you could just keep plinking away at monsters that do minimal damage, until your dodge rate gets up to 100% (or whatever cap is imposed, if any), then hit the boss. If you dodge before you get to 100%, try again. At least with quicksilver potions, you have to spend quite a bit of resources to obtain another one each time you successfully dodge

Actually this is not so easy. Tikki punishes you for taking repeated hits. Also taking damage means you expend a bunch of tiles to regenerate, so this is not without cost. And weak enemies are usually lower level than you, and thus strike after you, which means if you kill them you don't get hit. This is especially problematic for rogues with their high damage and innate first strike. Also going for 100% is just not viable. There is a cost to stacking, and the chance the chain will break before reaching 100% is very high.

Also the trick I theorized about (giving low level enemies first strike on purpose to easily stack up dodge) is not especially problematic. First off, this only actually helps for enemies that die in one hit. Which means they are dead after handing out their hit. Also it attaches a cost to killing off everything that you usually could kill in one hit. And rogues have innate first strike, which they give up by doing this, which means they trade one hit against the boss (from first strike) for one or two hits against the boss (efficient dodge stacking). Also Rogues aren't really viable with a really big sword, so they actually have to desecrate TT's altar, which means it actually has to show up for this to be possible. This leaves TT worshipers who switch and desecrate as the sole target audience for this trick.

Another way to easily stack up dodge is using GG's Sanctify to avoid killing low level enemies. This costs 5 piety for every use, which is quite a waste, and yet again doesn't work well for Rogues with their high damage bonus.

Taurog's punishment is another one, but lower damage means you get less damage against the boss out of your dodge. So this is hardly useful.

I think making all dodging work like quicksilver would work pretty well. Values would need to be halved or something to keep it balanced. Then again, nothing is really wrong with the current dodging mechanic, but I think the current dodge values are just too low to be useful. The "Die, snakes, die!" patch certainly helped with that, but compared with the boons from other gods and many class features dodge (and quicksilver) are still quite weak.

Why do all class features need to be strong though? Just playing Devil's Advocate I mean if we're talking about terrible class features I don't think anyone will be beating a vicious dungeon with Fighter anytime soon.

I agree that not all class features need to be good, as long as the class as a whole plays well. And yeah, fighters do kind of suck. Very little synergy with races, gods and dungeon features is the problem IMO. The bonuses themselves are actually pretty useful, except maybe the low level enemy scouting. Nobody cares about low level enemies, and they are plentiful enough anyway.

Dodge just doesn't work well with general DD gameplay IMO. If I cant count on it when I need it it's useless.